I drag the massive bear, the size of a house, behind me as I leave. The monsters inside this Fracture were the classic monstrous animals. Dire Wolves were the most common, but there was also a pack of Berserker Boars. Which were just boars but bigger and meaner. Nothing that was capable of slowing me down.

  Ranger Cooper, the man who took charge of the civilian militia’s defense of the Fracture gives me wide eyes as I drag a bear ten times my size. Dried blood coats the front of it, having poured from its neck. The missing head is clearly the cause of death—and the blood.

  “Well now, Mr. Machina.”

  He pulls his hat off and runs a hand through his hair before donning it again.

  “You really are as powerful as they say.”

  Once the Fracture closes, I drop the bear.

  “I appreciate the vote of confidence, Wane.”

  I point to the corpse.

  “I can’t exactly bring the Dread-Bear back with me, so you’re free to do with it as you wish. It’s a magical animal, so its pieces are probably valuable to someone.”

  I pull the head out of storage and drop it next to the rest of the corpse.

  “Can’t forget this. It’ll make a good trophy somewhere.”

  He looks at the monster for another second before nodding rapidly.

  “Don’t worry about any of that, Mr. Machina. We’ll take care of it!”

  He looks around at the group of hunters-turned-militia. All of them look slightly embarrassed.

  “Would…would you mind taking a photo with us, sir? It’s tradition for hunting, you see,” He finishes quickly.

  I laugh.

  “Sure, sure.”

  Once someone takes a picture, I leave, to a parade of applause and gratitude. It leaves me with a sense of… pride? Accomplishment? I know I’ve made a difference here, despite what Redding may claim. This is what I’m meant to do, who I’m meant to be. A monster-killing machine, with nothing lean about me. I sprint down the highway, headed east. If I don’t stop, I should be able to make it back in time for the hearing.

  And if I’m late? Redding will live with it— or not. It makes no difference to me. This was more important than anything he does or says.

  I walk into the Senate Chamber a few minutes late, and Redding gives me an angry glare. I notice Galvan, a 4-Star metal manipulator standing next to the door as I enter. McKinley and Rains are missing as well, but Morgan’s still here.

  “Not only are you late for this hearing that you have been ordered to attend, you completely disregarded my order to leave the city. It’s clear you have no respect for this vaunted and important institution.”

  “You’re wrong, Senator. I just don’t have any respect for you.”

  He slams his desk, face going red with anger.

  “How dare you! It’s very clear to me that you do not understand how this works! I am a Senator of the United States of America. I am the Chairman of the Senatorial Armed Services Committee. I don’t care who you are, what you can do, or what you have done. You will do what I tell you to do.”

  He straightens his tie.

  “Furthermore, because of your unplanned absence, I’ve been forced to send our most experienced servicemembers to clear a Category-1 Fracture that appeared very early this morning. I’m sure you understand the need to clear Fractures in a timely manner. Now that you’re here, I suppose we should begin. We still have much to cover.”

  What?

  I glance towards McKinley and Rains absence.

  “Are you fucking insane?!”

  A gasp passes through the crowd of reporters. Redding twitches.

  “What—”

  “You listen here, Senator. I don’t care how experienced you think 2nd Squad is. They could have been fighting monsters for years. They won’t clear it. They’ll die. You sent them to their deaths! The weapons they have are not good enough!”

  “Ryans you will be sil—”

  “No, Senator. I’m done listening to you. Doing what you tell me to do. Because I listened to you, stayed here, two hundred people are dead. I could have cleared the Triplet off Daytona in a day at most, and instead I was here. Listening to you ramble on about situations you neither understand nor care about. I hear you day in and day out bitching about taxpayer money!”

  Rage bubbles up, and the fire inside my faceplate flares.

  “WHAT ABOUT THE FUCKING PEOPLE!? You care about numbers on a fucking spreadsheet on some desk of some bureaucrat like it fucking matters anymore! It doesn’t! You know what matters?! People!

  “Every single one of them matters more than all the money in the world! You’ve been in your ivory tower so long you forgot there were people down below you!”

  I turn to leave, and Morgan gets up from her chair, a grin on her face.

  “Ryans you will sit down or else!”

  I whip around fast enough the air screams.

  “Or else what, Senator?”

  The room goes silent.

  I slowly stalk towards him, thick steel plates flexing under my weight. I can see Galvan looking nervous against the door.

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  “Or what? What exactly will you do to me?”

  Even on his raised desk, I still meet him eye-to-eye.

  “If I leave this room, what will you do? What can you do? I’ll tell you what. Nothing. You have no weapon, no person, no threat that can stop me!”

  He looks nervous, sweat dripping down his wrinkled face.

  “I-I’ll have you arrested?”

  “You and what pantheon?”

  He swallows nervously, and I move to leave again.

  “G-Galvan! Stop him!” Redding orders.

  Galvan steps forward, thrusting his hands out. A wave of magic pours forth. The steel plates warp and move like they’re alive. Steel tentacles reach for me, and then the wave of magic hits me.

  I can feel the magic trying to grab hold of something—anything, but it washes over me harmlessly. I am not made of metal. I have known this since I woke up for the last time.

  Galvan’s eyes go wide in shock. The grasping steel tentacles wrap around my legs. I tear them apart without slowing.

  “You best get out of my way, Galvan.”

  With a motion, a spike of steel lances towards me. It shatters on my chest.

  “Oh shi—”

  I punch him in the chest, and he goes flying through the door. It explodes into wooden shards that follow him out.

  Before I leave the Senate Chambers, I turn to look at Redding for a final time.

  “Don’t get in my way again, Senator.”

  As I exit the Senate Chambers, Morgan in tow, a half dozen steel spikes scream in for me, while more tentacles go to trip me up. I bat one spike away with a lazy slap, and the rest clunk uselessly against my armor.

  Four steel plates clamp down on me like jaws. I rip them apart with ease. Even magically reinforced by his control, they’re nothing more than wet paper when compared to my strength.

  “I’m leaving, Galvan.”

  He stumbles to his feet. His 4-Star constitution let him shrug off the hit and the resulting full-body breaching action.

  “Stay down.”

  “I’ve got my orders, Machina.”

  The few remaining steel plates fly to him, and melt around his body. They rapidly harden into armor, and he lunges forward. I lean into his charge with a strike. I use my superior height and hammer him into the floor with a boom. I put a boot on his chest before he can get up.

  “Stay down, Galvan. I’ve got people to save and I won’t have you slowing me down.”

  He struggles for a moment before going slack. His voice is muffled through his metal armor.

  “No one can say I didn’t try. Good luck.”

  I quickly move out of the Capitol Building, leaving deep craters in the tiled floor.

  I sprint down city streets, Morgan flying with me. I know where to go, having ripped that data out of the Pentagon’s servers. It doesn’t take us long for us to make to the brand new Fracture. I slide to a stop, tearing up more roadway and slinging crushed asphalt all around.

  Captain Rains and McKinley meet me, surprise on their faces.

  “Machina, what are you doing he—”

  “Where are they?”

  Rains points to the Fracture, ominously hanging the air.

  “They’re already inside.”

  2nd Squad is pinned down in a park, at least the twisted, nightmarish version of one. Callisto screams out orders.

  “Thor! Watch the east! Those fucking spiders keep coming!”

  She turns to Doc, who’s desperately trying to keep Eric alive. Blood is pouring out of a deep gash in his side. His brother is wielding a Walker in each hand. Each shot from the powerful revolvers blows a Glass Spider into sand, but ammo is running low.

  All twelve members of 2nd Squad are still alive— for now. It’s her job to keep them that way and it’s not looking good. The fact none of them are dead yet is nothing less than the luck of heavens. So far, no one’s gotten stuck with the green venom dripping from stained glass fangs. Unfortunately, Eric learned the hard way that their legs are still plenty sharp.

  At first, the mission went pretty well. They brought a few old AT-4 expendable rocket launchers to kill the boss, and a Barrett .50 cal to help out as well. They were moving through the city at a decent clip, only seeing a few monsters. They quickly put the few they saw down, and kept moving. Only the boss mattered.

  Despite what the brass thinks of them, Callisto knows that they aren’t nearly that good. They only saw action once, and to be honest, Machina killed pretty much everything. Still, apparently that was enough to justify sending them to clear this low-tier Fracture. Something is better than nothing, right?

  Though, the justification for sending them in here was bullshit. They all knew it. There wasn’t any need to send in a squad of infantry into a brand new Cat-1, experience or no. They had days before it would rupture, and DC had two Ascended in both Machina and Morgan.

  That doesn’t even count the dozen other 3-Starred Empowered, all of whom have become suddenly too busy to help. Still. Orders were orders. So in they went.

  And that’s how Callisto now finds herself in a park made by some magical hole in space, surrounded by magical monsters. The Glass Spiders might have been fragile, but they were quick and there sure were a fuck-load of them.

  Not to mention just how deadly they are.

  Sandra, a blonde haired woman goes down screaming as a Glass Spider, unseen while sneaking through the grass, pounces on her. Its fangs bite deep.

  “Oh shit!”

  Jericho whips around, and blows it off with one of the Walkers, and it clicks empty. He slides it back into a holster, with only two shots in the last one.

  Callisto scrambles for Sandra’s first aid kit, but it’s already too late. Her veins start turning green as tainted blood gushes from a wound in her chest. The four inch fangs cut straight through her body armor like it wasn’t even there.

  Callisto hears a skittering behind her, and she turns around just in time to see another Glass Spider leap from the grass. It moves almost in slow motion as she watches its fangs drip venom. It arcs through the air, the strange otherworldly lighting reflecting strangely off the stained glass body.

  A bolt of blue fire lances out from above and behind her, and slams into the monster. It disintegrates into nothingness, not even ash left behind. Eyes wide, Callisto turns around. She sees Mach laying into the swarm of glass arachnids. Flying high above is Morgan, wisps of blue fire evaporating away.

  Glass Spiders explode into shards of glass, some by boot, others by their own self-destructive rage. One Spider tries to sink its fangs into Machina’s shoulder, only for them to shatter. A metal gauntlet brushes it off. A stomp ends it.

  Morgan flies over to 2nd Squad, and notices Sandra’s mortal injuries. Sandra seizes and foam pours from her mouth.

  “Fuck!”

  Callisto lunges forward, but Morgan holds her back, her supernatural strength easily holding the more well built woman at bay. With her other hand, she quickly draws out a series of symbols that float in the air.

  LEIGHIS!

  With a pulse, a wave of green energy radiates out from the ritual, and the green venom running up Sandra’s veins vanishes. The choking foam disappears, and the pair of holes in her chest heal in an instant. Callisto looks over, and sees Eric rolling onto his side before sitting up. He pats himself down before looking incredulously at Morgan.

  She gives him a grin before flying up into the air. Her red hair floats in the air around her, ringing her head like a fiery halo.

  Mach quickly dispatches the swarm of Glass Spiders, the monsters melting away like butter in front of a blowtorch. The park, or what’s left of it, is pitted and cratered from Mach’s rapid, earth shattering lunges. His huge sword, closer to three times Callisto’s height than not, rests comfortably over one shoulder.

  His deep rumbly voice grinds out.

  “Sorry we’re late, Sergeant.”

  A laugh born of banished fear bursts forth from her throat.

  “Right on time! Thank you! Thank you!”

  2nd Squad rises to their feet, invigorated by Morgan’s powerful magic.

  Mach lumbers off towards the center of the malformed city.

  “Let’s finish up and go home.”